This past weekend while I was tuned in to an HBO snooze-fest, I saw an advertisement slash infomercial slash plug slash call to action urging Hollywood to hire more women directors for big budget and blockbuster films. I have no idea what the technical term was for what I was watching because it was about 15-minutes long so it wasn’t a typical commercial, it didn’t ask the viewers to send money anywhere so it wasn’t an advertisement or an infomercial and featured the likes of current actors and directors speaking on this problem that I didn’t realize was a problem, so it wasn’t quite a plug to watch the next great hit movie. Whatever it was, the call to action didn’t catch my attention until the third viewing when one of the reasons cited for women not receiving the calls to direct blockbuster films with larger budgets was that women are terrible with fiscal responsibility. *Gasp* Excuse me????
There have been thousands of studies and analyses completed on the subject of which sex is more efficient and effective fiscally. The vast majority of these studies agree that women win this title, hands down. I say the vast majority and not all because while I will not claim to have read every study, of the thirty or so I have seen, I have not seen ANY that point to males being the best financial stewards. I’m pretty confident 0/30 is a pretty good statistical indicator of population. Being a woman in finance, I can’t help but compare the similarities in this story with the lack of women in the C-Suite. According a CNN Money analysis published in March 2016, of the top five leadership positions in the S&P 500, 14.2% are held by women. That’s the CEO, Chief Financial Officer, Chief Information Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, or the Chief Operating Officer. 24 of these companies have female CEO’s, which translates to 4%. This leaves a whopping 10.2% of females in the other four positions. I’m not even going to discuss how many of these women are not white, today. That’s a totally different blog and not the point here. Women are not receiving the accolades to match the advances made in education over the past 15 years, where women are obtaining Bachelor’s degrees at a higher rate than men. But they are certainly not receiving the pay to match the student loan debt attached to the increases in education. The good news about the pay gap is in the last 40 years, the average gap has closed by 20 cents between women and men in general. The bad news about the pay gap is that it still exists and at the current rate it will not be closed for another 100 years.
In a nation where women still receive an average of 79 cents to every dollar men earn across all employment fields, Fidelity Investments published research in 2014 showing portfolios owned solely by women perform better than those owned by men. The average return on investment for the ladies in 2014 was 7.4%; the average return on investment for the gents was 7.3%. Not because women are better guessers at performance, but because women take fewer big risks with their investments. Experts chalk this up to the overconfidence of the male ego. (HA!) Men tend to have riskier portfolios and subsequently lose money more often than women. Women tend to hold investments with lower risks and reap higher rewards. Men perform investment trades more often than women and experts blame this paradigm on their overconfidence and egos. Ideally, in investing you want the highest rewards while taking the lowest risks. This strategy is proven to work and women have it down pat. Fortune 500 companies with at least three female directors have seen their return on invested capital increase by at least 66%, return on sales increase by 42%, and return on equity increase by at least 53%. So why aren’t there more females being hired to manage the moolah? Stereotypes.
When you take a look at the risk-reward model, in order to achieve the greatest rewards, you must be willing to take the greatest risks. Women are not generally subscribers of that theory. Therefore, the stereotype in both Hollywood and Corporate America seems to be accurate that a)women tend to make financial decisions based on intuition and emotions vs. hard logic and facts and b) women don’t go for the big jobs or ask for the big bucks as hard or a frequently as men do, ergo, minimizing both risk and rewards. It also fuels the belief that women will not be able to handle the high-pressure risky decision making necessary to make them successful as a big budget director or as a S&P 500 CEO. The idea that women just won’t be as good as a man in financial management positions has been embedded in our society to the point that we really don’t think about it’s validity or truth anymore – it is what it is and it’s not changing. In present day 2016, a good-ole-boys club still exists. There are men who don’t believe women are better financial stewards, and they speak for the masses. They make the C-level hiring decisions. They are the board members. They are the persons with the oversight on who they trust to direct their film ideas. They are even the ones who are running for President of the United States in 2016. (Le sigh.)
What do women need to do to become more visible in these roles? Women were “given” the right to vote and to equal education almost 100 years ago. Roe vs. Wade was 40 plus years ago. Yet, somehow, employers are not recognizing that diversity is not only an issue of race, but one of sex as well. In my opinion, ignoring for a second that HBO was cited as having one of the worst hiring rates for female directors, the HBO advertising slash call to action piece is a step in the right direction. Although women are scientifically proven to be better communicators than men, they shy away from conversations about finance, including salary negotiations, benefits, and promotions. We don’t discuss our credit scores, our kid’s college tuition, or our own student loan debt collectively. Starting a public conversation about the inequality in our systems will make more people take notice and learn this is a problem with the simple solution of actually looking at women for these positions, not because they are women, but because they are qualified to lead. Managerial diversity training is still necessary to move women forward in business. While it is not my dream to be a CFO of a Fortune 500 company, it is my dream that I have the opportunity available if it wanted it. Here’s to hoping the female directors in Hollywood gain momentum in this fight for equal opportunity and that female executives get the opportunity to bring a little Divatude to the C-Suite in my lifetime.
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